Entertaining guests at short notice  Without sweating it out in the kitchen

R.Y. Narayanan

COIMBATORE, Dec. 15

ARE you thrilled about the sudden finalisation of a bridegroom for your daughter but anxious over how to arrange for lunch the next day for the `Nikshayathartham' at home for a large number of guests?

Does your son take you by surprise when he announces that he would land at home with a horde of friends the next day before they are off for trekking and you are left wracking your brains over the menu?

Well, forget the hassles involved over preparing the food for a large number of people at short notice if you are residing in Coimbatore city.

A well known city based hotel chain  Sree Annapoorna Sree Gowrishankar group  has come out with a novel plan for providing lunch for a group of people at your chosen place which is cost-effective compared to entertaining your guests in a hotel.

You also have the option of ordering only select items like vegetables or sambhar or rasam that could be purchased by weight from the hotel if you decide to complete the menu by preparing the other items by yourself.

However, you have to place the order at least 24 hours in advance and have to make your own arrangements for taking delivery.

Speaking to Business Line here, Mr G. Vijayakumar, Marketing Manager, Sree Annapoorna Sree Gowrishankar Hotels Pvt Ltd, Coimbatore, which runs a chain of hotels in prime areas in the city, said the hotel chain launched about ten days back a new scheme styled `Janaranjani' but kept the launch a low key affair as it wanted to gauge the public response and to ensure its success initiative because of the group's positive brand image among the public here.

He said under this programme, the public would have to place the orders at the hotel chain's branch near the Sri Avanashilingam Women's college on Mettupalayam road in Coimbatore since the centralised kitchen of the hotel chain was located there.

The minimum order should be lunch for ten people.

The lunch for ten persons would cost only Rs 180 and would have the standard menu.

There was also a special lunch that would cost Rs 27.50 per head and would include sweets, payasam and curd.

Mr Vijayakumar said the customers would have to make arrangements for taking delivery of the food from its premises on their own.

But, if they so desired, the hotel would pack various items in plastic containers for a fee before they were delivered.

Under this scheme, only lunch would be provided and delivery could be taken between 11.30 a.m. and 2.30 p.m. and it would be available on all seven days in a week.

With the Sabarimala season just round the corner, he was confident of the scheme having a smooth take-off.